Various types of medical devices have been developed for providing therapy, diagnostics, and/or patient monitoring. Certain ones of these devices are configured for implantation within the patient's body and are typically referred to as implantable medical devices or IMDs. Others may be worn on the patient's exterior. Many of these medical devices include various amounts of electronic memory for storing device operating and control software, and various types of patient- and device-related data. In addition, some of these same medical devices may include signal processing and telemetry circuitry, that allows some or all of the data stored in the memory to be transmitted to a remote computer network or other communication node. The device may also receive and store data transmitted to it remotely from a computer network or other communication node.
The performance of such a medical device and the status of the patient's health may be assessed by retrieving device-related data and patient-related data from the medical device. In addition, it may be necessary to periodically update the software in the medical device. Data may be retrieved and/or updated software installed by having the patient visit a hospital or clinic, retrieving the stored data and/or installing the updated software by means of a programmer or other device. Depending on the frequency at which data retrieval or software updates occurs, this procedure can be difficult and inconvenient for certain patients, most notably for those that live in remote areas or those that may have limited physical mobility. Thus, various remote sensing and communication systems and methods have been developed to address these drawbacks.
Nonetheless, the need still exists for an easier, faster, and more cost-effective system for monitoring and controlling the performance of some medical devices and for assessing patient health on a regular and/or continuous basis that does not require patient presence at a health care facility. The present invention addresses at least this need.